Structures old and new

This is Orchid Elua, the house we stayed in for two weeks.  It's on the far eastern tip of the Big Island, in the Kapoho area.  The house has four bedrooms and four baths, making it ideal for a group of friends.  The pool is a natural pond, heated by thermal vents from the volcano to about 85 degrees.  It rises and falls with the tides...we're about two blocks from the ocean here.  There is excellent snorkeling in the tide pools a short walk away.  I've stayed here three times, for a total of five weeks.  It's almost like a second home!

Palms reflected in the pool.

Another reflection picture.

Another shot of Orched Elua.  There is a large stock of snorkel and pool gear at the house.

Now I'm in Hilo, looking up into a fine monkeypod tree.

The boat launch at Laupahoehoe Park, on the NE coast of the Big Island.  Surf was crashing pretty good this day.

The surf crashes over jagged rocks at Laupahoehoe.  This was the scene of a tragedy in 1946, when a tsunami hit here, taking out a schoolhouse and killing 24 people, mostly schoolchildren.

Pu'ukohola Heiau, on the Kohala coast on the west side of the Big Island.  This Heiau was built by Kamehameha I to commemorate his military victories that gave him control of the entire island.  The story is that the thousands of stones used in its construction were passed hand to hand by twenty thousand workers from the Pololu Valley about 20 miles to the north.  One interesting thing about this pic is the green grass all around.  This is the driest part of the island...receiving only around 10 inches of rain annually...but there had been significant rain in previous weeks.  I've rarely if ever seen this area this green.

Another shot of Pu'ukoloa Heiau from another older Heiau.  The area is a National Historical park.

Alas, I had to leave Hawaii.  I was not ready to come home, even after three weeks.  This was the sunset from Kona airport.

Volcanic Vistas

I'm home now, but here are some more pix from Hawaii Volcanoes NP.  This is the Devastation Trail.  In 1959 the dramatic eruption of Kilauea Crater produced this field of cinders just west of the volcanic vent that sent lava 1900 feet into the sky.  It gradually produced Pu'u Po'o, the cinder cone visible beyond the trail.

The barren ash field is slowly being revegetated.

 This is Kilauea Crater.  Prior to 1959 it had not erupted in 91 years and was about twice as deep as present, the bottom covered with forest.  The 1959 eruption filled the crater with about 400 feet of lava, which subsided somewhat, leaving a ring of lava around the crater edge.  For 36 years after the eruption molten lava persisted below the surface.  It has since solidified but is still hot, producing steam which is especially visible on cool, humid days.

 Well to the south of Kilauea, I took the Hiilina Pali road through an isolated, little visited area.  This old pahoehoe flow, probably at least 500 years old, is being revegetated.

 When I reached the end of the road at Hiilina Pali, fog shrouded the view.  Visibility was a few yards.  But I hung out in my car for about half an hour, reading the Sunday paper, and when I looked up the fog was lifting, and I had this vista, looking 2200 feet down to the sea.

Another shot from Hiilina Pali.

 On the return trip, back into the fog.  With few people around, the cool mist lent an air of primeval beauty to the scene.

A bit farther down the mountain, the vast pahoehoe field from the 1969-74 eruptions of Mauna Ulu lay sullen in the gloom.  The source of all this lava is faintly visible in the far distance.

The lava flow ends abruptly at the kipuka in the distance...a kipuka is an island of forest spared by the lava flow.

Puna Lava Patterns

Roamed around the Puna district on the Big Island yesterday. The region has been shaped by lava flows both ancient and recent.  This pic is at Kehena Beach, a black sand beauty created by a 1955 lava flow.

This is a 1990 lava flow at Kalapana, about five miles from Kehena.  I was here in March of that year, and at dusk I could see the lava glowing as it oozed down a distant mountainside.  A few months later the flow buried most of the village of Kalapana, a historic Hawaiian cultural spot.  It's a fairly rainy area, and revegetation is well underway, helped in spots by the local residents.

A pahoehoe lava landscape.

Pahoehoe is a viscous lava that flows like molasses, creating rich, varied shapes.  As the lava hardens it cracks, giving soil a chance to collect in the fissures and harbor new plant life.

The locals have added artwork to the Pahoehoe.

It's a warm, windy area, but in spots new coconut palms are thriving.

The 1990 lava flow buried a famed black sand beach at Kaimu, but created a new beach several hundred yards to the south, on new land added by Madam Pele.  Much of the beach has now been eroded by pounding surf but some sand remains, dotted with palms planted by the locals.

Black lava meets blue sea.

This area of the lava landscape looks fresh.  Blow up the pic and you can see steam plumes on the far hillsides, where lava continues to flow downslope from the Pu'u O'o cone out of sight to the left.  This area could be recovered by lava at any time...or not again for thousands of years.

Coco palms and black sand.

The palms are planted simply by putting a coconut into the sand.

The Americans basically seized Hawaii from the Hawaiians in the 1890s for imperialistic and strategic reasons.  It had been an independent kingdom for most of the 19th century, and a collection of island kingdoms for a long time before that.  Some Hawaiians would like their state to be an independent country again.  Given the current regime in Washington, I'm sure the number of independence advocates here is growing.  

A striking plant in the lava.

This lava is only three years old.  In 2014 a flow from Pu'u O'o moved toward Pahoa while I was vacationing here.  The lava reached the outskirts of town, which had not seen a lava flow since 1840.  The lava forced the closure of several businesses and destroyed one house before coming to a halt just a quarter mile or so from the only highway that leads out of the entire Puna district.  It's a wet area so revegetation is already under way.

Another shot of the lava near Pahoa.  A couple of gravel escape roads have been bulldozed through the jungle so people will be able to drive out of Puna in the event of another lava flow cutting the main highway.

These are lava trees near Pahoa.  A 1790 eruption moved through a forest of large ohia trees; the lava enveloped the moist trees and stuck to the trunks as it cooled.  The wood in the trunks later burned or rotted away...so some of these formations are hollow.

A cool huge funky leaf.